Summary: We will not investigate Miss Y’s complaint about the Council’s handling of her housing case because there is insufficient evidence of fault to justify our involvement and further investigation would not lead to a different outcome.

The complaint

1. Miss Y complains about staff conduct, and bias in the handling of her housing case. She says staff acted inappropriately and discriminatory towards her.
2. Miss Y also complains about the Council’s complaint handling.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or

• any fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• we could not add to any previous investigation by the organisation, or
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome, or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants, or
• there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

4. We will not usually investigate complaint handling if we are not investigating the rest of the complaint. This is because there is not usually enough injustice to justify us doing so. We collect information about particularly poor complaint handling practice and report this back to organisations. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), section 34B(8))

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information provided by Miss Y and the Council.
6. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. Miss Y received a response to a Subject Access Request (SAR) she submitted to the Council. She says information within the response was contradictory to things she had been told, and it evidenced discriminatory behaviour by staff. Miss Y complained to the Council about this.
8. The Council accepted the quality of some communications between staff fell below the expected standard. It apologised to Miss Y and advised it was investigating this internally through its own personnel procedures. It did not, however, find that any communication was demonstrative of bias or discrimination in its dealings with her. Further investigation would not lead to a different outcome or add to the Council’s response so we will not investigate this part of the complaint.
9. It is also not for the Ombudsman to decide if an organisation has breached the Equality Act. This can only be done by the courts.
10. Miss Y says the SAR response proved the Council gave her misleading information about a withdrawal of a property offer. The Council explained it did have a property for Miss Y to consider. But following a wider professionals meeting, it was decided the property was not safe or suitable for Miss Y. It said communications in the SAR response showed that staff did not want to tell Miss Y that the property was simply unavailable, but it wanted her to know why it was no longer for consideration. There is insufficient evidence of fault in the Council’s actions so we will not investigate this part of the complaint.
11. Miss Y also raised concerns about the length of time she has been on the housing register and said the Council has continually looked for reasons not to assist her. The Council confirmed Miss Y is in the correct banding for her circumstances, in line with its allocations policy. It acknowledged her frustrations and explained the significant discrepancy between supply and demand for social housing. There is insufficient evidence of fault in the Council’s actions so we will not investigate this part of the complaint.
12. Miss Y has also complained about the Council’s complaint handling. However, where the Ombudsman has decided not to investigate the substantive issues complained about, we will not usually use public resources to consider more minor matters such as complaint handling. I accept there were delays in the Council’s response to Miss Y’s complaint. However, it did respond to her after she had raised a complaint with us, and it apologised for its delays in doing so.

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Final decision

13. We will not investigate Miss Y’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault to justify our involvement and further investigation would not lead to a different outcome.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman